Monday, October 22, 2012

Mixed-Sex Tag Team Wrestling

In sports there is a significant
amount of difference in the average performance of men and women, in same
sport. As men have natural advantage in terms of muscles, height, stamina,
etc. For example, Marathon, world record for men is 2:03:38, set by Patrick Makau
of Kenya on September 25, 2011 at the Berlin Marathon.The world record for
women is currently 2:15:25, set by Paula Radcliffe of the United Kingdom on
April 13, 2003 at the London Marathon. [Difference
– 11 Minutes 47 Seconds]. Long Jump Men’s World Record [8.95 Meters], Long Jump
Women’s World Record [7.52 Meters], and difference [1.43 Meters]. One more
interesting fact is that when we take the average performance in many sports by
males and females the difference increases significantly than the world record
figures. However, I think that there are many skill based sports where men
and women have equivalent chance like Chess, Badminton, Billiards and Golf etc.

Mixed doubles is played with one man and one woman
per team. It is one of the formats in Tennis and Badminton. Mixed Doubles (Tennis) is now part of Olympics
(2012).

I believe that Women Pro Wrestling should get more
spotlight as all over the world many amazing women performers are working for
different wrestling companies. Major wrestling promotions can introduce a
“Mixed-Tag Team Championship” as there are many underrated, underutilized
wrestlers who never get what they deserve due to the huge size of roster and
long, footage consuming and often boring storylines between/among the main
event people.

As Vince McMohan announced in late 1980s and shocked the
world (got mixed response from the wrestling fraternity, promotions) that Pro
wrestling is not a competitive sport and matches have predetermined
outcomes to heighten entertainment value.

The mixed tag experiments were done in the past but not properly executed and promoted, “such
matches features mixed-sex teams, but differs from an “Inter-gender match” in
that only wrestlers of the same sex may be in the ring at the same time. For
example, if a woman tags her male partner, both women leave the ring and both
men enter. This label is also used for other unusual pairings, such as a normal
sized wrestlers teaming with midgets, when the differing wrestlers are not
allowed to face one and other.”

Now, the question and challenge is how performers will convince
audience if a male and female are in ring against each other. Writers can frame
some basic rules to make such contests realistic and entertaining.

*) – Women wrestlers facing men in ring can use chairs,
weapons.

*) – 45 Seconds or a minute Tag-Time out, if male and female
wrestler are in the ring. Then after the timeout, a male or female member of a team irrespective
of tag must go in the ring depending on a team’s turn. Imagine teenish wrestler against a 7 feet Kane
getting crowd cheer, response to spend few seconds with the opponent or a “coward-weak”
male up against lady wrestler like Victoria, Chyna.

*) – A simple men vs. men or women vs. women in the
introductory phase, which will not be that much exciting as it will look like a
regular match.

*) – No pin, submission, etc applied on opposite gender but the male
wrestler of Team A can weaken or injure the female from Team B and then the
female (Team A) can get the advantage.

Some interesting rules should be there to increase the
entertainment factor. Introduction of Mixed-Tag Team Championship will –

1) - Help promote the mid-cards.

2) - Showing the dominance of a stable having tag
team championship and mixed-tag team championship.

3) - Provide
various permutations-combinations for the main events like Mixed-Tag Steel Cage
Match, Mixed-Tag Hell in a Cell, etc.

4) - Revive the Women Roster of a promotion and
provide opportunity for more ladies to be in limelight.